Matt Tuckey is a writer from Oldham, England. He covers celebrities, night life, Manchester, fitness, creative writing, social media, confidence and events. Some of this may, in some way, help others. Or maybe it'll just entertain you for a while.

Friday, 26 September 2014

Well, I
said here I'd
smash the 95Kg bench press mark I've been stuck at since June 2013. I
thought it'd take 2 months; in a little over 1, I'd managed it.

I had
been feeling really weak for the fist few sessions, and I felt
exhausted in work. But my manager pointed out that for the sheer
amount of time I'm spending exercising I should be eating a LOT more
than I was. So I started to pack in the food- the tuna, the beef, the
mixed salad- and my energy levels returned. My physique is sharpening
up, my strength improved and I've focused in work a little better
too.

I also
managed to go up one weight in horizontal dumbbell fly, something I'd
been stuck on since May 2011. The free weights are very popular, hence
the wait.

Finally,
the ladies have noticed a bit of a leap in size. In my arms, I mean.
Can't complain! I still need to cut out Crazy Caramels, though...

Wednesday, 24 September 2014

I have
no phone. I woke up Tuesday morning and my mobile had turned into an
inoperable brick. The Xperia P- which has 2 months left on its
contract- wouldn't make calls, had no stored texts, no contacts, no
internet access and every app had stopped working. This is a SERIOUS
ballache, for more reasons than I care to go into here. It's where I
store a lot of things that I'm likely to forget, so this malfunction
is akin to a veritable lobotomy.

I've
been into the Three store on Market St- they want me to take it to
the St Anne's branch, which shuts at 6, so I'll have to drop in later
this week.

The
point I'm making is, if you've tried to contact me and checked on
here, I'm not ignoring you. Try tweeting me
here.

Tuesday, 23 September 2014

New
house music club Static opened Saturday 20th
Manchester. Headed up by DJs Adam Guy,
Nick Hussey,
John Besant and Martyn Russo the club inhabits
18-22 Lloyd St, around the side of the Town Hall, the unit formerly
home to Boutique. It's a small but smart venue with a strict door
policy, but those who make it in will be treated to fantastic house
music, good DJs, beautiful podium dancers and regal décor.

The
launch night, fronted by house music brand Hed Kandi, saw a fair crowd attend. not rammed, but
comfortably busy, populated by mostly good-looking people with good
attitudes. It also saw a dance-off between myself and another guy
who- predictably- I schooled.

The only
criticisms I had were that the drinks were dear, even compared to
other house music clubs, and that paying for them was hard due to
long queues and apparent reception problems with chip and pin
machines.

At the
moment it looks like it only opens Saturdays, but it wouldn't
surprise me if they started a Friday event soon. Stay up to date with
their Facebook page.

Wednesday, 17 September 2014

The
United Kingdom is a powerhouse on the world stage. Our athletes rake
in medals at the Olympics, and in particular our boxers and martial
artists have succeeded brilliantly in recent years- Scots won 7 out
of 29 gold medals for Team GB in the 2012 London Olympics. Their
whisky industry has a £4 billion turnover.
Yet as it stands, the UK is already the 22nd
smallest country in the world.

Our
armed forces are and always have been one of the best in the world.
Losing Scotland would mean losing not a third but HALF of our
military might. Don't boot yourself out of NATO, guys.

Friday, 12 September 2014

Went to
Geordie Land for a stag do. Started in Florita's bar (recommended)

We had a
VIP table booked in House of Smith next door, a smart,
classy club featuring stage shows including fire-breathers and a
zip-wiring dwarf in a cape. We booked a VIP booth, with table service
provided by the lovely Christie

The only
downside was drunkenly pouring Woodford Reserve into my eye.

We
were (or, more “I was”) too wasted to get into Lap dancing club
Blue Velvet, where the doorman told us we'd missed local model / page 3 girl /
famous-on-twitter person Chelsea Ferguson.

Saturday:
we dressed the stag in a gimp suit and took him through the city from
pub to pub, parents shielding their children's eyes as we led him
through the high streets. We sat him on a park bench next to a tramp,
who woke up in a state of paralysed terror, the whole scene making a
great photo. We settled in Players,
a male-orientated sports bar where short-but-big-boobed girls in
Newcastle football tops danced on podiums. The DJ unceremoniously
bollocked me over the mic for taking this picture

It took
me a second to realise I was the “Cliff Richard” he was referring
to, and that everyone in the bar was staring at me. It's not that
kind of bar, if you get me. Suffice to say, I did not pull in here.

We sat
the stag in the “dentist's chair” and plied him with booze, cream
and cranberry juice. He was a warrior and skulled the lot of it.

(Not our
stag)

There
was a refrigerated metal bar fixed into the floor on supports,
coupled with an LCD display. The DJ was challenging people to hang
off the bar, testing their grip strength. I managed 1 minute 14,
better than some.

We'd
scouted out a row of trendy bars for the evening. I went on soft
drinks from hereon in as the previous night had hit me hard. We
started with Madame Koo,

Thursday, 11 September 2014

Instagram
and Facebook now have a popular trend in common: #tbt, otherwise
known as Throwback Thursday. Each week millions of people will dig
out their old pictures to upload to social media and embarrass their
friends, relatives, but mostly themselves.

The #tbt
trend, however, can be really helpful for encouraging people to
upload more than old pictures of themselves. Every piece of
contemporary information- every current news topic, every photograph
shot today, will more than likely be uploaded to the net within hours
of its creation. Older material, however, may not have been and
hence wouldn't have been unless someone decides to. Whether it's an
old article from a newspaper, a photo, a painting or something shot
on VHS-C back in 1998- there could be something in a corner cupboard
or attic that might interest or assist someone somewhere in the
online world.

The
#tbt trend is great for encouraging web users to dig around and find
archive material, whether it's Leeds Rhinos captain Kevin Sinfield playing Joseph in a school play,
or Mark Zuckerberg in 2005, describing his new application called
“The Facebook”
. (Not that the Zuckerberg video was necessarily attached to the #tbt
trend, but you see what I mean.)

The
majority of retro finds, like the majority of internet content of any
age, won't be particularly important. But it doesn't cost anything to
put it out there, and once in a while somebody is going to unearth a
gem.

One
organisation that has uploaded more than a few gems- an entire
goldmine of archive footage- is British Pathe.
Their Youtube account has more than 85,000 videos featuring funerals, wars, weddings,
disasters and plenty more besides. I know nothing about digitising
film reels, but old film footage is a fascinating contribution to the
web. History nerds could spend their life on Pathe's Youtube page.
Other hoarders of footage may soon follow suit and share what they
have.

Why not
join me and millions of others in digging out retro material every
Thursday? You just don't know what people might want to see...

Monday, 1 September 2014

I
want to show you something. It may mean nothing to you… it may not.
I don't know. I don't know anymore.

-Ricky
Roma (Al Pacino), Glengarry Glen Ross

GGR
is one movie you need to see. Al Pacino. Alec Baldwin. Ed Harris, the
director guy from The Truman Show. Kevin Spacey. Jonathan Pryce. Jack
Lemmon. Alan Arkin, the psychiatrist from Grosse Point Blank. It's a
masterpiece in acting.

Likewise,
I have no idea myself whether what I'm about to show you will mean
anything, but show you I will.

Here's
my Ice Bucket Challenge video.

Continuing
the Throwback Thursday online trend, I dug out not a picture but a
cutting from a university newspaper that I was featured in 11 years
ago. This blind date article appeared in Student Direct, the
university newspaper. Check out how she graded me!

Celebrity
gossip email Popbitch linked to my blog after years of me sending them tidbits. “Kevin Sinfield Playing Joseph” was
intriguing enough to get linked up, raking in
over 6400 hits, smashing the whole blog past the 300K page view mark.
I'm very happy about this. Whether Sinfield MBE himself is equally
pleased by it, no word yet. Strangely, a matter of days after this
was published, Sinfield announced his retirement from international
Rugby. I deny all accusations.

I
also went on a stag do to Newcastle. Full post to follow. Like Roma,
I don't know any more.

Would You Like to Write for Power is a State of Mind?

Here at PIASOM I'm looking for guest bloggers to get involved. I want you to:1) Tell the world about the superb city of Greater Manchester. If know of something quirky, awesome, bizzare or important happening, why not get involved?2) Show me your ideas of producing great literature. Do you perform excercises at a writing group? Do you compete in poetry slams / rap battles? Are you setting up a magazine? Tell me and get your writing seen. More info:http://powerisastateofmind.blogspot.com/2011/03/would-you-like-to-write-for-power-is.html